


new and familiar

by strawberrv



Series: keith on skates [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Autism, Autistic Keith (Voltron), Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, meltdowns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2019-05-27 03:55:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15016145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrv/pseuds/strawberrv
Summary: keith hasn't had a meltdown since he was seventeen, and that was before he met lance. after a bad day at work, he's falling apart, and worried about lance seeing him this way.





	new and familiar

**Author's Note:**

> HI. there's not enough autistic keith fics so here i am, ur local autistic bts writer to save the day !  
> lol so keith works at sonic idk if they have these overseas but it's basically just a fast-food drive through and all the employees wear roller skates, it's unrelated to sonic the hedgehog. lance is in college studying media literacy! shiro lives a town over, but k and l live in the Big City. (not that big)  
> probably gonna wanna write more using this au. tell me if u like it!  
> if u have any autism questions or wanna get my steaming hot Takes on keith's autism, hmu in the comments ! enjoy !

lance pulls into the fourth sonic carside station, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel to the rhythm of the shawn mendes song on the radio. the ordering screen and menu are both already dim; he can just barely make out the silhouettes of various deep fried foods.

it’s a few minutes before keith comes out, skating primarily on his right foot over to the passenger side. lance flips the lock and turns to greet keith, but hesitates once the latter slides into the car. he’s tense, which isn’t uncommon for keith immediately after work, but he’s clutching his slushie with more grip strength than is completely necessary for a styrofoam cup. 

the red straw sticking out of the lid is chewed completely flat and twisted at the tip. all bad signs. 

keith scratches his neck and starts shaking his leg.

“how was it?” lance broaches, keeping his voice soft. keith doesn’t answer until lance has pulled away from sonic and is back on the main road, and even then it’s just a slightly agitated shrug that lance barely catches in his peripheral. then keith huffs loudly and takes a sip of his drink, only to linger and start up chewing on the plastic straw again.

ok. extremely bad signs. lance begins going down a mental checklist of how he left the house, if they should order out for dinner, and where he left all of keith’s stim toys.

they stop at a light and keith makes an unhappy noise, strangled in his throat like he didn’t mean to let it out. lance looks over, taking in keith’s features bathed in red by the traffic light. his brows are furrowed, lips pursed and jaw set. there’s a red patch of skin just behind his red polyester collar, like he’s been scratching all day.

lance chews his lip, worried, worried. 

the house is dark when they get back, and lance decides on leaving it for a second while he sets down the keys and his school bag. keith beelines for the couch, not even bothering to change out of his uniform, which lance knows he hates wearing.

keith digs around the box on the end table and comes up with the red and orange tangle hunk found for him when they drove up to phoenix last month.

he fits it between his fingers and lance lets himself be a little relieved. keith stimming means keith actively trying to feel better, instead of letting it fester. lance moves to the kitchen, flipping on the living room light in the process.

/

keith rolls his neck. stimming isn’t helping.

the red and orange tangle sits in his lap, caught between his fingers. it’s too much, it’s not enough.

if he shakes his leg as fast as he can it keeps him a little above the waterline, barely neutral. 

lance flips on the overhead light and a wave of uneasiness followed quickly by anger rolls over him. he shakes his head. he knows he looks mad. he hates being mad, which only feeds the anger, which, you know. perpetuates it. vicious cycle and all that.

he can feel lance’s eyes on him, and it’s pissing him off. the light continues to piss him off with each second.

he unloops the tangle from his index and ring fingers and reaches for the half-melted slushie on the table. his fingers graze the styrofoam when he remembers -- they ran out of grape.

he _always_ gets grape but they ran out so now he has lime. at the time it didn’t really bother him, but now he can feel it pile onto everything: the light, the useless tangle, the customer who yelled at him at work, the itchy polyester uniform, lance rummaging around in the fridge, and _now!_ he doesn’t even have a grape slushie! fuck!

he distantly knows he’s breathing heavier, and he can feel his face heating up, and he grips his tangle with one hand, squeezing and squeezing.

the textured plastic is unmoving in his hand and he lets out a frustrated groan as he slams it down on the table. he feels like a porcupine, sharp and scary-looking and teeth bared at nothing in particular and he _hates_ it. he digs his nails into his arms and it’s -- it’s ok, he’s ok.

he’s cooking in the sun on asphalt, he’s melting but it’s ok.

oh.

melting.

_down._

interesting.

he hasn’t had a meltdown since he was seventeen. three years. before he met lance.

_oh._

before he met lance.

jesus. he has to get up, he can feel it under his skin now, the open circuit. horrible energy jumps from his head to his stomach to his bones. he has to get up, this is only getting worse. he has to get up, lance can’t see this. 

“keith?”

fuck. he has to get up, but he can’t move his body. his brain is telling him that everything involving his skin is pain now, and it’s also stuffed his tongue down his throat, so he can’t talk.

“is everything ok?”

keith wants to hit himself. he’s lost the fight before his eyes can even track his fist down to connect with his thigh. still not enough.

“keith! oh my god,” the couch dips and lance’s fingers are around his wrists, pulling them away, and keith is revolted, he’s holding his breath, he’s crying in the corner of the classroom biting his hands while his classmates look on.

he squeezes his eyes shut, and he’s being held down in foster homes, hands around his wrists. 

he aims a punch outward, thumb over knuckles, right hook like shiro taught him. he doesn’t process it landing, but his hands are free, and he can only pull his hair, he can only shake his head so hard his brain hits the insides of his skull, he can only open his mouth and bang his legs against the bottom of the couch and he can only say, “nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnng!!”

he launches himself into a throw pillow and it’s dark in there, and he can’t breathe but he doesn’t like doing that anyway. he curls his legs into himself, and he can’t even rock to stim, it’s too much, it’s not enough.

he’s completely still except for the constant pressure he’s applying to his scalp.

this is all he can do.

this is all he can do.

/

lance is shaking, but only a little. he’s worried, and worried, and keith has one hell of a right hook, even when he’s…. well. that part lance has yet to figure out.

what he does know:   
1) keith’s been upset since he got off work  
2) stimming didn’t help  
3) keith’s in pain

number three is the one making lance’s stomach churn. when keith punched him lance immediately let go of his wrists and -- yeah, in retrospect probably not the best idea in the first place.

he watches keith yell out short, consonant-exclusive sounds.

he watches keith pull his hair and he watches keith curl into a warped ball, face down in one of mrs. holt’s needlepoints, and lance doesn’t know what to do.

there is one person that lance trusts to care about keith as much as he does.

“hello?”

“hey shiro,” lance takes a steadying breath.

“keith’s um. something’s wrong with keith and i don’t know how to help.”

there’s a pause on the line, some shifting around.

“what do you mean wrong? should i drive down there?”

“no, um, i don’t think so. i guess he had a bad day at work and i thought he just needed some down time at home to recover but -- but he just didn’t? like, he hasn’t spoken to me at all since i picked him up, and, and he just seems really frustrated and like, overstimmed but to the _max,_ you know?”

he glances over. god keith looks miserable.

“ok, he might be having a meltdown.”

“a --? oh. OH.”

meltdown. yeah, he definitely remembers that from his google deep-dive after keith told him he was autistic. but keith hadn’t mentioned them specifically, so he hadn’t taken note.

“yeah. is he safe? at home?”

“yeah,” lance swallows down the pang of guilt. he should have been ready for this.

“yeah, he’s on the couch.”

“good. you’ll wanna turn off the lights and try not to make too much noise. probably don’t touch him either, unless he says otherwise.”

“he, um, i think he’s nonverbal.”

“oh. then have some way of written communication ready for him.”

lance tucks the phone between his cheek and shoulder as he scans the living room for a notepad.

“ok. ok i can do that.”

“he’ll be ok, lance. i know it’s scary but you’re not doing anything wrong.”  
lance nods.

“mhm. yeah. ok. thank you, shiro. i’ll text you later.”

/

keith forgot how much this shit _hurts._ there’s not really a.... relief. like with physical pain, there’s usually a parting of the clouds, like, _oh, it’s gonna be ok._

with this, it’s just sort of like keith’s an electrician in his own brain, testing the sparking and spitting raw connections until they don’t shock him anymore.

it’s embarrassing, he’s embarrassed. he thinks lance is probably looking at him. it’s not gonna be ok.

he loses a little time. but then he can move his face.

it’s dark in the living room now. he blinks.

stays there for a few more minutes.

then he can sit up, knees still up to his chest. it’s probably the quietest he’s ever heard the apartment, a pad of silence around him.

then he looks to the far end of the couch, where lance sits. dim light from the kitchen illuminates him from behind, and now keith sees he’s lying in lance’s shadow. a notepad and pen are clutched in white-knuckled hands, just below a gaunt expression.

keith still can’t talk, or, maybe he could but he really doesn’t want to, not yet. lance holds up the notepad, face out, and it reads in careful lettering, _is it ok if i touch you?_

keith blinks again, slowly taking stock of the way his shirt feels on his skin. he nods.

lance inches closer until their toes are touching, and he takes one of keith’s hands.

they sit like that for another indistinguishable chunk of time, until keith can say,

“mmmmm.”

lance smiles, and kisses his hand. keith picks up the notepad and pen and writes, _i’m sorry._

lance writes back, _don’t be. i called shiro and he helped me._

keith says, “mmmmm,” again. he unfurls his legs and shoves himself into lance’s torso until they’re hugging. lance gently runs his fingers through keith’s hair, and only now does he realize how sore his scalp is. he winces. tries his very best not to feel ashamed.

the first time he had a meltdown in front of shiro, he was twelve and he believed it when his foster parents called them tantrums.

shiro told him,

_no. you’re trying to communicate how much it hurts._

keith holds lance tighter, and then he can say, “i love you.”

lance rocks back onto his knees and says, “i love you.”

/

later, they review some autism resources online, and keith points out what he would and wouldn’t like to happen in the case of another meltdown.

lance apologizes for restraining him, and keith confesses some of the more specific ableism he experienced in the foster system.

lance kisses his wrists, and says, “your soul is so strong it could probably suplex me. i love you.”

keith laughs and says, “probably?”

and, here, the clouds finally part, keith thinks, _oh, it’s gonna be ok._

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! <3
> 
> redboykeith.tumblr.com


End file.
